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Originally Posted by squiddler
A hand gear only i.e rod and reel, hand line, or harpoon only, no nets over 10 feet in diameter, no pots over 5 on trawls, etc. fishery could support many a bayman again and supply the local markets with fresh fish as well as domestic and international trade with gourmet and high end restaraunts..... Don't threaten to cut them off entirely, only force them to micro size and change their ways......
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You can't change a pickel back into a cucumber. The fish wholesale industry has aggressively marketed over the last 10-20 years to establish new domestic and foreign markets. A quaint, smallboat, "bayman" type fishery would never be able to supply today's demand. Since demand would far outstrip supply, prices would skyrocket. Maybe the doulbled, tripled, or even quadrupled prices would be enough to convince the dealers, proccessors, and wholesalers that they'll still be able to maintain thier very comfortable lifestyles despite a downsized fishery.
Many nations place little or no restrictions on thier fishing fleets, despite heavy international pressure to do so. Unilateral action by 1 or 2 countries will never be effective.
Unfortunately there is no easy answer. Days-at sea regulations only show limited success. Boat buy-back programs have been uneven at best and a ludicrous waste of taxpayer dollars at worse (case in point: US gave subsidized loans to boat owners in the 70's to build more, bigger, more powerfull scallop boats, then offered to buy them back in the late eighties/early ninties to reduce fishing pressure).
Round & round we go... where it stops....
